Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

Re:Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances by geofft on Tuesday March 19, 2019 @12:57PM (#19432735)

Having them be proper applications would be a huge problem for the security and therefore the computing autonomy of the average person. The fact that you don't generally download unsandboxed, unsigned apps from the internets any more (and don't run shrink-wrapped apps from the local CompUSA that are full of C string parsing vulnerabilities, either) is one of the most meaningful accomplishments in computer security in the last decade. If you want to throw it out, you personally can clean up the Bonzi Buddies on every Windows user's computer. The most malicious JavaScript web page still can't install Bonzi Buddy. We've even gotten to an era where most people don't need to install anti-virus, because moving everything to the web has fixed the fundamental problems with desktop OS design that required a quasi-snake-oil, theoretically-untenable approach to maintain a semblance of integrity.

There's another alternative, which is curated and audited app stores à la iOS, but the fact that you can't use applications unless they're approved by a megacorporation would also be bad for people's computing autonomy.

(Also, what makes you think that the developers of bloated JS apps won't make bloated desktop apps?)

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Re:Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances by anoncake on Tuesday March 19, 2019 @01:03PM (#19432802)

Thats a false dilemma. You can have sandboxing without running pseudo-applications in a document viewer and without walled gardens.

> (Also, what makes you think that the developers of bloated JS apps won't make bloated desktop apps?)

Nothing. Its possible to create garbage desktop apps. But its impossible to create non-garbage web apps.

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Re:Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances by geofft on Tuesday March 19, 2019 @01:11PM (#19432907)

> You can have sandboxing without running pseudo-applications in a document viewer and without walled gardens.

Please expand on this claim. What is a "pseudo-application" and what is a "document viewer"? In particular, how does having an app runtime outside a "document viewer" accomplish the goals you would like to see?

> Its possible to create garbage desktop apps. But its impossible to create non-garbage web apps.

Please expand on this claim. I've seen tons of non-garbage web apps.

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Re:Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances by saagarjha on Tuesday March 19, 2019 @01:26PM (#19433091)

> What is a "pseudo-application" and what is a "document viewer"?

Presumably, a webpage in a browser.

> In particular, how does having an app runtime outside a "document viewer" accomplish the goals you would like to see?

> I've seen tons of non-garbage web apps.

Good web software can't compete with good native software in things like performance and platform features, so this is my guess as to what is considered to be non-"garbage".

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